THIS invention relates to electronic radio frequency identification (RFID) systems and more particularly to such systems including at least one interrogator or reader and a plurality of transponders.
In known systems of the aforementioned kind, the interrogator is caused to transmit a radio frequency (RF) interrogation signal towards the transponders. The transponders respond to this signal by backscatter modulation of the interrogation signal with a data message including base data which may include an identification code characteristic of the transponder.
During transmission by the transponders a brief burst of high-intensity radio noise from any source may temporarily overload the radio receiver of the interrogator. A noise burst may result from sources including natural phenomena, other active transponders in the interrogator antenna field sending data simultaneously, or signals emitted by other radio services not associated with the RFID system. The effect is to corrupt the data message received for at least some of the duration of the noise burst, resulting in a xe2x80x9cburst errorxe2x80x9d in the message. In a digital network, a noise burst typically results in a burst error in which some or all of a consecutive sequence of data bits are received incorrectly.
A second kind of burst error may occur in the transmitted data bits when the signal is temporarily below the threshold of the receiver of the interrogator due to propagation fading. Alternatively, signal drop out may occur due to cancellation caused by multi-path transmission between the transponder and the interrogator. The net effect on the transmitted data is the same in that a burst error occurs where some or all of a number of consecutive base data bits are received incorrectly.
It has been found that typical burst errors in transmissions of the kind utilized by the system and method according to the invention are four (4) to six (6) bits in length. Since burst errors are a statistical phenomena, this means that there will be many which are shorter and some which may be much longer than 4-6 bits. The burst error length and the average interval between bursts vary with frequency and noise origin. Therefore, any method utilized for correction or compensation for burst errors ideally must be robust enough to handle one or multiple burst errors of varying length within a single data message.
Several approaches may be taken to deal with the effect of burst errors in a digital data message. The first step is to detect that they have occurred. Digital error-detection techniques such as parity checking and the CCITT Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC) have been used for error detection in systems that use digital messages to carry the base data. A common approach to ensuring accurate communication is to use error detection in conjunction with on-demand retransmission (such as an ACK/NAK protocol) as a method of ensuring accurate data message receipt. The message is retransmitted until no error is detected. This method works as long as there are some clear, noise-free intervals long enough for the entire message to fit into and to be received without errorxe2x80x94when the interval between noise bursts is less than the message length, it cannot succeed. For this reason, long messages are usually broken into a sequence of many short data packets, each of which is treated as a separate ordered component of the entire method and transmitted separately. Once all the packets have been received correctly, the complete base data can be accurately reassembled.
A major weakness of this method is that increased communications time is required, both from the extra communications overhead of packet transmission and from the number of retransmissions which may be required for the entire single message (or all its component packets) to be received once without error. A second weakness of this method is that it requires that the data message source be in two-way communication with the receiver. This is not always feasible, as in deep space communications.
Forward Error Correction (FEC) is used when data must be sent over noisy channels, and under situations such as deep space communications, where on-demand retransmission is not feasible. This involves sending some redundant information along with the required base data as part of the entire data message. The receiver can determine from the totality of data sets received in the message whether the base data was correctly received, and use these additional data sets to detect and correct erroneous data bits until the base data can be reconstructed without error, or with an acceptable level of accuracy.
One approach to FEC is to multiply retransmit the base data within the data message, possibly as algorithmically transformed, and apply voting techniques to determine the correct base data bits in the presence of noise. This method was used by Lowe in U.S. Pat. No. 5,742,618. The main disadvantage of this is that it requires multiple copies of the base data to be encoded in the data message as a means of ensuring accurate reception, greatly increasing the transmission time. In addition, while this method requires little computational capability it is non-deterministic in error correction. It requires only that a majority of the received data sets agree; regardless of whether or not they were correctly received.
Accordingly it is an object of the present invention to provide an electronic identification system; a transponder forming part of such a system; and a method of operating a RFID system with which the applicant believes the aforementioned disadvantages may at least be alleviated.
According to the invention there is provided an electronic identification system including:
an interrogator for transmitting a radio frequency (RF) interrogation signal;
a plurality of radio frequency transponders;
each transponder being operative in response to the interrogation signal to respond with a forward error correctable data message including base data encoded as symbol characters in accordance with a forward error correcting code and check characters on the base data as defined in the forward error correcting code, for facilitating reconstruction of the base data in the event of corruption of the forward error correctable data message during transmission; and
the interrogator including
receiver means for receiving the forward error correctable data message; and
data processor means programmed to utilize data relating to the forward error correcting code, the symbol characters and the check characters in the received forward error correctable data message, to reconstruct the base data in the event of corruption of the received forward error correctable data message.
The forward error correcting code may be a member of the class of trellis codes, more particularly of the class of convolutional codes.
Alternatively, the forward error correcting code may be a member of the class of linear block codes, such as a Hamming Code, a Binary Golay Code and a Reed-Muller Code.
Further alternatively, the forward error correcting code may be a member of the class of cyclic block codes, such as a Fire Code and a Bose-Chaudauri-Hocquenghem Code. Preferably the forward error correcting code is a Reed-Solomon Code.
In one embodiment the system may include a code generator means for generating the forward error correctable data message which generator means is external and separate from the transponders; and each transponder may include: a data memory arrangement into which the forward error correctable data message generated by the external code generator means is pre-programmable to be stored therein; and control circuitry for causing the transponder to respond with the stored forward error correctable data message in response to the interrogation signal.
The code generator means may for example form part of the interrogator.
In another embodiment each transponder may include: a data memory arrangement wherein the base data is stored; and local code generator means forming part of the transponder for locally generating the forward error correctable data message.
Further according to the invention an electronic identification system may include:
an interrogator for transmitting a first radio frequency (RF) interrogation signal;
a plurality of radio frequency transponders;
each transponder being operative in response to the interrogation signal to respond with a forward error correctable data message including: base data in the form of identification code data unique to the transponder encoded as a first set of symbol characters in accordance with a first forward error correcting code, a first set of check characters on the identification code data as defined in the first forward error correcting code, other base data encoded as a second set of symbol characters in accordance with a second forward error correcting code and a second set of check characters on the other base data as defined in the second forward error correcting code, for facilitating reconstruction of the identification code data and other base data in the event of corruption of the forward error correctable data message during transmission; and
the interrogator including
receiver means for receiving the forward error correctable data messages; and
data processor means programmed to utilize data relating to the first forward error correcting code, the first set of symbol characters and the first set of check characters in the received forward error correctable data message; and further programmed to utilize data relating to the second forward error correcting code, the second set of symbol characters and the second set of check characters in the received forward error correctable data message, to reconstruct the identity code data and the other base data respectively, in the event of corruption of the received forward error correctable data message.
The first forward error correcting code and the second forward error correcting code may be the same. However, in a preferred embodiment they are of different types.
The interrogator may be controllable to transmit the first and a second interrogation signal; each transponder may be operative in response to the first interrogation signal to respond with a first forward error correctable data message including the first set of symbol characters and the first set of check characters; each transponder may further be responsive in response to the second interrogation signal to respond with a second error correctable data message including the second set of symbol characters and the second set of check characters; and the data processor means may be programmed to utilize the data relating to the first error correcting code, the first set of symbol characters and the first set of check characters in the received first forward error correctable data message to reconstruct the identification code data in the event of corruption of the received first forward error correctable data message; and the data processor means may be programmed further to utilize the data relating to the second error correcting code, the second set of symbol characters and the second set of check characters in the received second forward error correctable data message, to reconstruct the other base data in the event of corruption of the received second forward error correctable data message.
The invention also includes within its scope a transponder for use with an electronic identification system including an interrogator for transmitting a radio frequency interrogation signal and for receiving a response signal from the transponder, the transponder including
control means; and
a data memory arrangement into which is programmable data associated with the transponder;
the control means being operative in response to an interrogation signal to utilize the data associated with the transponder to cause the transponder to respond with a forward error correctable data message including base data relating to the transponder encoded as symbol characters in accordance with a forward error correcting code; and check characters on the base data as defined in the forward error correcting code, for facilitating reconstruction of the base data in the event of corruption of the forward error correctable data message during transmission.
The forward error correcting code may be a member of any one of the aforementioned classes, but preferably is a Reed-Solomon Code.
In some embodiments of the transponder, the data memory arrangement may be configured to be programmed with the forward error correctable data message as pre-generated by an external code generation means for storage therein; and the control means may, in use, utilize the stored forward error correctable data message to respond to the interrogation signal.
In other embodiments, the data memory arrangement may be configured to be programmed with the base data; the transponder may include local code generator means for locally generating the forward error correctable data message; and the control means may, in use, utilize the locally generated forward error correctable data message to respond to the interrogation signal.
Also included within the scope of the present invention is a method of operating an electronic radio frequency identification system including an interrogator and at least one transponder; the method including the steps of:
causing an interrogation signal to be transmitted by the interrogator;
causing the transponder to respond to the interrogation signal with a forward error correctable data message including base data encoded as symbol characters in accordance with a forward error correcting code and check characters on the base data as defined in the forward error correcting code, for facilitating reconstruction of the base data in the event of corruption of the forward error correctable message during transmission;
receiving the forward error correctable data message; and
causing an error correction means to utilize data relating to the forward error correcting code, the symbol characters and the check characters in the received forward error correctable data message, in order to reconstruct the base data in the event of corruption of the received forward error correctable data message.
Another method of operating an electronic radio frequency identification system including an interrogator and at least one transponder may include the steps of:
causing a first interrogation signal to be transmitted by the interrogator; and
causing the transponder to respond to the interrogation signal with a forward error correctable data message including: base data in the form of identification code data unique to the transponder encoded as a first set of symbol characters in accordance with a first forward error correcting code, a first set of check characters on the identification code data as defined in the first forward error correcting code, other base data encoded as a second set of symbol characters in accordance with a second forward error correcting code and a second set of check characters on the other base data as defined in the second forward error correcting code;
receiving the forward error correctable data message; and
causing an error correction means to utilize data relating to the first forward error correcting code, the first set of symbol characters and the first set of check characters in the received forward error correctable data message; and further to utilize data relating to the second forward error correcting code, the second set of symbol characters and the second set of check characters in the received forward error correctable data message, in order to reconstruct the identity code data and the other base data respectively, in the event of corruption of the received forward error correctable data message.
As stated hereinbefore, the first forward error correcting code and the second forward error correcting code are preferably of different types.
Another form of the method may include the steps of: causing a selected one of the first and a second interrogation signal to be transmitted; causing each transponder in response to the first interrogation signal to respond with a first forward error correctable data message including the first set of symbol characters and the first set of check characters; causing each transponder in response to the second interrogation signal to respond with a second error correctable data message including the second set of symbol characters and the second set of check characters; causing the first and second error correctable data messages to be received; causing the error correction means to utilize data relating to the first error correcting code, the first set of symbol characters and the first set of check characters in the received first forward error correctable data message to reconstruct the identification code data in the event of corruption of the received first forward error correctable data message; and causing the error correction means to utilize data relating to the second error correcting code, the second set of symbol characters and the second set of check characters in the received second forward error correctable data message, to reconstruct the other base data in the event of corruption of the received second forward error correctable data message.